The Flesh of Swine
by marapozsa
Summary: You and I know the truth. She was never Zalera's. The burden to bear was always for Mateus.


**The Flesh of Swine**

a k a n t **h a e** - h i _m e_

**Authoress' Note & Disclaimer:** Dedicated to icor, who is fantabulous when it comes to writing about Espers. This might be a smidge late - heck, a whole lot more than a smidge - but here it is. I hope you enjoy, for I've little to say this time. And no, I don't own anything, nor do I know what was running through my head when I dubbed this 'The Flesh of Swine.'

(The title was blatantly stolen from a chapter in Garth Nix's Lirael, the second book of the Abhorsen Series.)

-

_**i. the shamaness**_

_Perhaps, even before he had swept her away as one of his own - perhaps even before that she had always nursed a bit of darkness in her heart. A bit of what vainglory she would allow herself, because too much might have been her downfall. In the end, that tiny bit of proud vanity was what held her back. It made her ask herself questions she otherwise would not have dared to ask. Afterwards she would not have been able to tell you what those questions had been._

Zalera looked human. The shamaness had called to him in anguish; wished for an existence away from the corruption that had taken all she held dear. She had expected fire and brimstone and anger to fuel the Esper's visage but only Hume ignorance made him seem as though her were humanoid. It was a distorted image that the shamaness saw. Women rarely saw what they wished not goodwill...and after all, the shamaness didn't fear death. How many times had she delved in the realm of the long-gone at the Esper's expense to find what she sought was unattainable?

Now was the time. She felt it. Her final request as a denizen of the living would be something that he _could_ give her: in person, in the flesh, not as a sound floating on the wind but as a material being she could truly believe in.

The shamaness bowed reverently. Her offering would be her name. She would offer up the proof of her existence in return for his momentary power and not even the worry gnawing at her spirit would stop her.

(Black tresses, the fringes as jagged 'round her thin frame as the shards of heartbreak were 'round her heart. They fell around her face, hiding what tears she could muster even now behind the blindfold binding her spirit to the decaying body, as she spoke words of power that would seal her fate. Her clothing fell to the ground as well, robes of tainted vermillion red on a background of pure white and cherry pink. Naked would she come before the gods, with no name of her own, to appeal to their darker natures in search of vengeance. Zalera would be her name from now on, his robes of nightshade her only coverings; and as his petitioner in addition to her own.)

The plague would descend on the world that had wronged her so. It would all be part of the grand scheme of things, the grand scheme to which Zalera catered...as always.

-

_**ii. mateus**_

_Claws the color of gemsteel scrape his face. They are accompanied by a banshee's wails...just another little voice crying inside his head. They torment him no longer. As one becomes accustomed to the monotony of another sunrise on the horizon, so too does the Corrupt slowly get used to those wails. Soon they will be silenced underneath the cries of other poor souls beneath the cry of __**his**__ power._

The goddess' story is not as melancholy - nor is her mood, thrashing about like a fish on a line as he holds her even tighter in her bonds - as that of the shamaness his fellow Esper Zalera commands; but Mateus knows which of the two is the one without hope...only anger, hatred, fear, and the willpower to destroy the only salvation she has access to.

(He would show her mercy yet, coward that he knows he is, for even cowards seem to be capable of affection.)

The fear is what he feeds on, the source of all his holiest power. The goddess once called herself Mneme, memory, but now she cannot remember anything. She has no eyes with which to see. In place is a crystal mirror that reflects only what he wants her to see. The folly he torments her with is something created from her tears in a time when she still had lips to sob and eyes to cry.

...She has no eyes with which to see; but at least her torture is not self-inflicted. It is not self-restraint that stops her from ripping her bonds off, not her choice. Not her shrill mindless shrieks echoing inside someone else's head: his.

Mateus, at times, wishes he had that choice. The power of a wish soothes the cold sores the ice goddess leaves behind in her fingers' wake. It soothes the wounds until they come no longer and he is forced to bind her conscious as well as her body.

-

_**iii. zalera**_

_Clouds of lavender-scented smoke billowed gently around his form. They shifted into contortions and unknown shapes until finally settling into a ragged cloak to cover his form. The form of the altar 'round him told him that it was not such a fool as one he thought that had the courage to summon the Death Seraph unto them...draperies dyed a most vehement shade of red; candles letting off a scented incense smell like battlefield carrion; an assortment of ceremonial knives under the fingertips of the shamaness; and the shamaness herself, her body bare as if to offer him everything in return for the judgements only he could pass._

He was appalled at the conserved attitude she showed him. Such flowing words leaking out of the corners of her mouth...such exquisite beauty. A wonderful prize, he thought, would be the man who might garner such beauty at his disposal. Even better if it were the Death Seraph himself.

Such thoughts sealed the shamaness' fate. Previous to the moment Zalera had let tinges of annoyance run scattershot 'round his mind, determined to smite whosoever would dare summon him with such a light heart. Few even knew how, but the few who could were either of a different make than an average shaman or simply fools.

But she...the shamaness with such cunning as Mateus would ever wish, such beauty as Ultima might even envy...by his side, she would remain an unmined gem. Fear would do no good with her; the lady with the dark heart and hatred of her own people. It would serve his purposes for her to think she was special. His sadistic side, however, shone through with no drawn curtains to be seen. His image made a mockery of humanity; still, she wasn't cowed.

She reminded Zalera of himself. She was selective, special, and even now he could tell something was eating her away from the inside. That same material thing was what fed his strength, the bleeding black inks inside his gut.

She would be very useful indeed, regardless of what tales **others** would spin of her unwillingness to aid him.

-

_**iv. the ice goddess**_

_She does not thirst for freedom. Her thirst has ever been quenched by her own tears. The melting of ice around her body is only tempered by his stubborn resistance against the flames of the worlds beneath her feet, bound and thrashing ever still. She has been reduced to a dripping icicle in the midst of a vast ocean where once she was a voluminous glacier. The ice goddess can no longer see, but that does not prevent her from wishing. So long as she knows Mateus cannot truly take away her free will, she will linger as a mist of fluid...his living shield of immaterial immortality._

What **can** she wish for?

(Nothing. Wishes never come true.)


End file.
